Eric Joyner: Painter of Toy Robots

"The usual suspects"

"The last Tin Man"


"The Incident"

"Time Travelers"

Believe it or not, but toy robots have been somewhat a theme in my marriage. On our first Christmas together Scott gave me a red toy robot and read science fiction stories out loud to me. Connecting to the symbols from the beginning of our love story, I gave Scott a tiny little toy robot for our 10th wedding anniversary. This year for his birthday and our 15th wedding anniversary together, I had a special surprise for him. A couple of years ago when we visited La Luz de Jesus gallery in LA, we saw a beautiful small painting of a toy robot and admired it very much. This September we saw an exhibition by the same artist, Eric Joyner at the Shooting Gallery in San Francisco. Afterwards I checked out Eric's web site and saw that he had prints of his paintings for sale. I knew immediately that this was my present for Scott. The best part of this present was, that we visited Eric's studio and Scott didn't know where we were going until we rang Eric's door bell. A perfect surprise! Eric was so gracious and fun, showing us his art, although he was getting ready to pack for a show in Vegas. It was hard to pick out a print, because they are all wonderful, but I think Scott picked the best "The Time Travelers" (last image). I love the composition of the two scenes meeting in the middle. Samurai warriors fighting robots is the ultimate little boy dream. It is also interesting in the sense of two worlds colliding: the old japan versus the new.

Strange creatures for the altar

Art Toys for adults is the new rage. Mostly these toys are designed by young artists from the Comic, Japanese and Low Brow Art Scene. Kid Robot is one of the hot places to get these toys. They have a store at Haight/Ashbury, but are now also on-line.

I just recently came across these Art Toys and bought the one featured in the top picture. These strange, surreal creatures are the brain child of an artist long gone: Hieronymus Bosch (1450 - 1516), who painted visions of heaven and hell. The 3 creatures in the pictures above, no doubt escaped from hell and can be seen in his triptych " The temptation of Saint Anthony".

The company who made them offers also other toys created after masterpieces of art history. From Dali to Edgar Degas , from Klimt to Modigliani check out their toys. I do like the Bosch the best though.

TRAGIC KINGDOM: THE ART OF CAMILLE ROSE GARCIA

Black Dawn Rising, giclée print with hand-applied mica glitter on archival paper.


Antarctic Suburban Outpost, 2006. Acrylic and glitter on wood



The San Jose Museum of Modern Art is showing a fabulous exhibition of Camille Rose Garcia's work. She is part of the whole LA Pop-Surrealist or Lowbrow Movement. Her art is spooky-cute! A strange and enticing combination of sadness and naive kitsch. I can recommend the beautiful book that accompanies this exhibition (published by Last Gasp) and my husband bought my daughter and me two of Camille's dolls. Here is a picture of Lulu and conjoined sisters Sadie/Katie.

Camille paints a child's fairy tale with all the pains that we inflict on our world by destroying the environment , killing animals, fighting wars. She named a cycle of paintings aptly "The saddest place on earth" , a reference to Disneyland, that is billed as the "Happiest Place on Earth" - and indeed we see a sugary sweet realm, but understand it is fake and it's reality is based on pain and sadness. Click here to read about her on the San Jose Museum Of Modern Art web site and watch Youtube video interviews with her.

Here is a close up of the Chirimen frogs and flowers and of a little toy I bought in Tokyo, called Sonny Angel. These little doll babies come with different hats, that look either like fruit or vegetables or animal heads. I only got this little grape guy, but wished I had bought these other ones too.